Grandfather Goosey-Gander was quite the next day from having been caught in the brush pile, and could not go very far away from the duck pen. He did manage to hobble around on the which Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy made for him, and he sat in a sunny corner, reading the newspaper with his glasses which Susie Littletail found. He was reading away as Alice, Lulu and Jimmie Wibblewobble were playing about on the edge of the pond, and the little duck children made so much noise that the old grandfather could not understand what was in the papers.  
"Can't you children play something quiet?" he asked for Papa and Mamma Wibblewobble had gone visiting, and Grandfather Goosey-Gander was left to mind the house. "Play some nice, easy game," he suggested.
 
"Let's play tag," said Lulu.
 
"All right, you're it," answered Jimmie. So they each took an acorn which they found in the woods and put it in their bills. Then Lulu had to chase after Jimmie and Alice, and when she touched either one of them with her wing she had to call out: "You can't run a little bit, I've tagged you, and now you're it." Yes, that's what she had to call, and she had to do it without letting the acorn fall out of her bill. Now, if you think that's a very easy thing to do, just you try it, that's all.
 
Lulu didn't have much trouble putting her wing on Jimmie or Alice, but, every time she tried to call out the little verse the acorn would roll out of her bill and she'd have to start all over again, or it wouldn't have been fair. So it was some time before she got over being "it," and then it was Jimmie's turn.
 
Well, they played acorn tag for quite a while, and, when they got tired of that they all went in swimming. They swam around in circles, and criss-crossed and went in squares, and in triangles and all sorts of queer figures, including eight, nine, ten, which are very difficult figures, indeed, for little ducks.
 
While they were swimming away, having lots of fun, and far enough off so that Grandfather Goosey-Gander could read his paper in peace, who should come down to the edge of the pond but the rooster. His name was Mr. Cock A. Doodle, and he was very proud. He walked right down to the edge of the water, and looked at the ducks. Then he crowed as loud as he could, and flapped his wings, just as if he were saying:
 
"There! I'd like to see any of you do that! Ha! Hum! Oh my, yes, indeed!"
 
"How do you do, Mr. Cock A. Doodle?" asked Jimmie.
 
"Ahem! I am pretty well, my young friend," replied the rooster. "And how may you happen to be to-day? And how are your sisters, Lulu and Alice Wibblewobble?"
 
"We are very well," answered Lulu and Alice, and Lulu went on: "Don't you wish you could swim, Mr. Doodle?"
 
"I can," said the rooster, and he back and at the edge of the pond. "Certainly I can swim. What put the notion into your heads that I can't?"
 
"We never saw you," Jimmie.
 
"Ahem! Perhaps not. You never saw me stand on one foot and jump over a barrel, but that doesn't prove that I can't do it," replied Mr. Doodle. "I can swim if I choose. I have never cared to, that's all."
 
"Try now," suggested Lulu, for she didn't believe that rooster could swim, no matter what he said.
 
"Oh, the water is too cold to go swimming now," said Mr. Doodle. "I never swim in cold water."
 
"Why, it's as warm as warm can be," declared Alice, and she splashed a few drops upon the rooster, so he could feel it.
 
"Well, er—ahem! The wind is blowing too m............